Lunar Lander — the game — at 40. Among the millions who watched the Apollo 11 landing was a 17 year old Massachusetts high school student named Jim Storer. In the fall of 1969, around the time of the Apollo 12 launch, Storer took his inspiration to class with him. There, he programmed a simple…
Tom Wolfe (author of space program biography The Right Stuff (which incidentally was the movie I took my first-ever date to see back in 1983) ) describes how the Cold War derailed the grand adventure of space exploration. Shockingly, the decay started while the Apollo program was still underway. [I]n October 1969, I began to…
This tutorial shows how to rig the fingers in a very clever way. I’d seen this technique described in a text tutorial somewhere, but after seeing it here, I understand it. I also appreciated seeing how to adjust b-bones so that they only rotate, without bending (which results in noodly-looking joints). I really love Blender,…
The first man on the moon doesn’t feel his life is defined by being the first man on the moon? As if the world would remember much more than Armstrong’s “one piece of fireworks”? Would his name belong beside Magellan’s or Marco Polo’s if not for Armstrong’s singular achievement? —Paul Farhi, Washington Post Similar:Travel trouble,…
This morning, hundreds of Amazon Kindle owners awoke to discover that books by a certain famous author had mysteriously disappeared from their e-book readers. These were books that they had bought and paid for–thought they owned.–David Pogue, NYT The citizens whose Kindles needed rectification had purchased unauthorized George Orwell books. So 1984 disappeared down the…
It might sound like a logical extension from the likes of Buzz and You Don’t Know Jack, but you’ll have to believe that this [Xbox Live] game is ringing the death knell for game shows as loudly and vigorously as it possibly can. Why watch a game show, when you can participate? Why shout at the TV,…
Walter Cronkite, the CBS News anchor who famously became the most trusted man in America, died Friday at the age of 92.–NPR Similar:'Babylon 5' Reboot in Development at The CW From Original Series Creator J. Michael Stracz…The Variety story breaking this news doe…Current_EventsTARDIS from today's 3D printing class.AestheticsYou have 20 minutes before the sun blows…
The HD version actually came out better than I thought it would. More photos after the jump… Similar:The annual patriotic showing of #1776 has begun.CultureMe, contemplating the implications of maybe doing a socialize this weekend.PersonalNot a #carguy but I pried open the hatch of the van to change 4 bulbs. #adulting PersonalParadise Blue (so glad to…
The LA Times technology blog critiques the new Google Reader interface. For example, let’s say we have a news article that we like. Well, might as well click the “like” button, right? OK, now we’ve told the Internet that we think it’s cool, and we can see a list of strangers who also think it’s…
Talk about penny wise and pound foolish! NASA admitted in 2006 that no one could find the original video recordings of the July 20, 1969, landing. Since then, Richard Nafzger, an engineer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre in Maryland, who oversaw television processing at the ground-tracking sites during the Apollo 11 mission, has been…
Amazing! Similar:In August, 2002, I was blogging about ebook readers and email in teaching; how urban legen…In August, 2002, I was blogging about …AcademiaWhat Happens When Digital Cities Are Abandoned?“The great paradox about these digital c…CultureWhy Study Humanities? What I Tell Engineering FreshmenWisdom from science writer John Horgan.[…AcademiaCOVID-19 deaths vs. other common causes (in America)…
A great interview, on Adventure Classic Gaming. Was something like Adventure inevitable? That’s a tough question, but I think probably so. I’d say that the real wild-card here is not Adventure but rather Adventure‘s inspiration, Dungeons and Dragons. You just can’t exaggerate the importance of D&D to all of the many storygames that have followed it.…
A bit predictable, but still enjoyable. Similar:It’s been a while since something got me into a movie theater. Obviously I wasn’t in a rus… It’s been a while since something got …AmusingSet design for Acts II and III of R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) #blender3dDesignThe false link between Amy Coney Barrett and The Handmaid’s Tale, explainedOne…
Wired has a good piece about the value of local reporting. “In every town in America, almost, you have reporters going out and doing humble jobs and turning over rocks every day and seeing what’s under them,” says John Carroll, the former editor-in-chief of The Los Angeles Times, a man who led his newsroom to…
And you thought the secrets to academic success would involve sensible stuff like “Study for two to three hours for every hour of class” or “Keep up with the readings” and “Meet all the deadlines your prof sets.” But those won’t help you game the system, which is the strategy Don Asher presents as the…
Clearly by “Them” the sign means “dogs,” but the since the sign refers instead to “Your Dog,” so it was already in need of some attention even before this alteration took place. Via Bryan Alexander. Similar:14% of Americans [say that they] have changed their mind about an issue because of somethi…Young men are more than…
The following started out as routine e-mail feedback on a freshman essay, but I thought it came out well enough that I might want to use it again. I don’t want this to get buried in my existing handout on thesis statements, so I figured I’d just post the good bits here. A good academic…
I missed this when it came out a few weeks ago. At Hopkins, Knudson uses Twitter as an extension of the classroom, asking students to raise questions, hold discussions online, keep up with breaking news and share links to interesting stories. She believes the limited number of characters allowed is a useful way to remember…
A website will re-create the 1969 moon mission in real time (allowing for the 40-year time lag). http://wechoosethemoon.org/ Similar:Wander (1974) — a lost mainframe game is found!Interesting news for historians of digit…Current_EventsVenus Flytraps Are Even Creepier Than We ThoughtI clicked for the topic, but it was the …AestheticsWhy won't the University of Maryland talk about…
First, there is a general increase in use of Facebook and a general decline in use of MySpace across the board. In 2007, 79% of the study participants were using Facebook while in 2009, 87% of the sample reports doing so. In contrast, while in 2007, 55% of the group reported using MySpace, in 2009,…